First Sight

by Donohue, Laura

“You know Marissa has a big mouth.”

  “Then I guess it will be sooner rather than later.”

  I laughed and thought that he was such a typical guy, not bothering to explain anything. I couldn’t really imagine him walking into the office this morning and randomly announcing our new status to Elizabeth, but she must have wondered what had happened after our big fight last week. I don’t think she actually would be surprised though that we had made up and gotten together. She had been just as bad as Marissa recently with her interest in Travis and me. I took another bite of my burger and noticed that Travis was already halfway finished with his.

  “How do you eat so fast?”

  He shrugged. “I’m a guy. So how was your morning?”

  “Aside from Marissa’s interrogation? Typical Monday. Lots of emails to go through, stuff to sort out, etc. Tomorrow’s going to be rough though. I think we finally have all of the reviews in, so we’ll be doing the final layout and proofing. It seems like something is always coming in at the last minute though, so I have a feeling it will be a late night.”

  Travis nodded as I spoke. “I was in a meeting with one of the freelancers this morning, going over the last of his reviews. I mean, the reviews were fine, but he hadn’t fact-checked the hours or correct addresses of some of the places. I mean, that’s what we’re paying them for. It’s kind of a waste of my time to be doing his job.”

  “I’ll be so relieved when this week is over,” I said, sighing. “But on the bright side, we’ll be done with this publication.”

  “Yeah, I won’t be too sad when we can stop working late every night.”

  I glanced down at my watch. “Ugh, do we really have to go back to the office? Spending the afternoon with you sounds like much more fun.”

  “Unfortunately, I think they might notice if we’re gone,” he said with a laugh.

  “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

  I slid out of the booth, and Travis stood up as well. “Come on,” he said, putting his arm around my shoulder and pulling me to him. It was the closest we’d been all day, and I relaxed against him as I felt the warmth of his body against mine. We slowly walked to the door, neither of us eager to return to work. “Let’s make a quick detour,” Travis suggested. “I’ll buy us coffees on the way back.”

  Chapter 19

  The next couple of days were so busy that I barely had time to think about anything but work. At our weekly meeting, we’d discussed the remaining aspects of the project. Although it had gone much more smoothly than our disastrous meeting last week, everyone was stressed out from the heavy workload and tight timeline remaining. I was desperately looking forward to sending the publication off to press so that I wouldn’t be stuck at the office late each night and Travis and I could spend some quality time together. Starting a relationship couldn’t have come at a worse time as far as stress from work was concerned. Although it had been wonderful spending last weekend together, aside from lunch on Monday, we’d barely had time to reconnect this week. I was looking forward to some quiet time alone with him this weekend.

  I spent all of Wednesday afternoon with Marissa in the large conference room, the pages of the layout spread out across the table. As Marissa was explaining some of the graphic elements she’d incorporated, my mind drifted, and I recalled stopping by Travis’s office that morning. His eyes had brightened when he saw me, and as he bent down to quickly brush his lips against mine, he’d said that I looked beautiful.

  “What do you think?” Marissa asked, bringing me back to the present. I looked down at the page she was gesturing at.

  “Yeah, it looks great,” I said, telling myself that I needed to focus.

  Elizabeth peeked in the doorway. “How’s everything going?” she asked.

  “Ugh—it’s very slow going. How’s the website stuff?”

  “It’s in good shape.”

  “Well I’m glad someone is making progress,” Marissa muttered. “Come over and tell us what you think of this layout.”

  Elizabeth walked over, her brown hair cascading down around to her shoulders, and I realized she was dressed nicer than usual, wearing a green twin-set and knee-length cream skirt. “You look nice today,” I commented.

  “Thanks,” Elizabeth said hesitantly, and I knew immediately that she was about to broach the subject of Travis. Because the two of them shared an office, she must have some idea of what was going on in his life. “So, you and Travis?”

  “Yes,” I said slowly, a smile twitching at my lips. “It’s that obvious, huh?”

  “No,” she said, shaking her head with a laugh. “I’ve just known for a while that Travis was interested in you. That combined with the fact that you guys were always spending so much time together; it seemed inevitable.”

  “That’s what I’ve been telling her for months,” Marissa interjected with a grin. “Of course, Maddy wouldn’t listen to me.”

  “I guess I was never…sure,” I said, frowning slightly, as I tried to find the right words. “You know, sure about how he felt, sure about dating a coworker. We just needed to work things out on our own.” I pointedly raised my eyebrows in Marissa’s direction.

  “Yeah, yeah,” she said, nonchalantly waving her hand.

  “I can tell that he’s crazy about you,” Elizabeth said kindly. I felt an unexpected flush of pleasure wash over me. It somehow made it feel even more real when other people talked about Travis to me—like I hadn’t just imagined last weekend or his feelings for me. This was really happening.

  “I think you might be right,” I said, unable to stop the smile from spreading over my face. “Anyway,” I said, trying to steer the conversation back to the task at hand. “What do you think of the layout?”

  Elizabeth walked over and took a closer look. “I think it looks great, guys. I love the new graphic elements you’ve incorporated.”

  “It definitely looks more modern and fresh,” I agreed. I glanced up at the clock on the wall. “Yikes, I’m supposed to have a quick meeting with Jennifer in a few minutes. I’ll catch up with you guys later.”

  My meeting ended up taking longer than expected as Jennifer had a few last minute changes, so it was 5:30 before I walked back to my desk. Marissa was still there working, and from her exasperated expression, probably would be for a while. I plopped down into my chair and spun around toward her. “It’s going to take me hours to type all this,” I groaned, holding up my yellow notepad filled with pages of scrawled instructions.

  “Are those her edits? Why is she just giving them to you now?”

  “I have no idea,” I replied, feeling exasperated. Jennifer had been in the office over the weekend. She didn’t need to wait until the last minute to provide all these additional changes.

  “I’ll be here all night, too. Elizabeth gave me the last of the sections she was editing, so I’m inserting them into the master document right now. But I still need to add the remaining parts from you and Travis.”

  “Did Elizabeth leave?” I asked.

  “Yeah, she finished the updates to the website, and her sections were done. Her husband’s coming home tonight—he was away on some business trip or something.”

  “So that’s why she was so dressed up today!” I said, laughing.

  “You noticed, too?” Marissa grinned.

  “Yeah, I thought maybe it was your influence.”

  “Well, I like to think so,” she said jokingly.

  “You like to think what?” a male voice asked. I looked up, and my heart skipped a beat to see Travis casually leaning against the door, arms crossed, eyes crinkling in a smile.

  “She likes to think she has good fashion sense,” I explained.

  “Oh, but I do.”

  “So, what do you think?” Travis said jokingly, gesturing to his button-down shirt and khakis.

  “I’ll leave that one up to Maddy,” she said with a smile.

  “All right,” I interrupted. “I’ll be sure to carefully note my opinions on Travis’s wardrobe
from now on.” I glanced over at him and rolled my eyes slightly. He shot me back a killer smile, and I couldn’t help but smile back, before turning my attention to Marissa. “But I really need to get started on this so I’m not here all night.”

  “You’re right,” Marissa agreed with a sigh. “Let’s finish this and get the heck out of here.”

  “That’s actually why I stopped by,” Travis said. “Since we’re all going to be stuck here for a while, do you guys want to order a pizza?”

  “That sounds good,” I said. “I’m starting to get hungry.”

  “What kind do you like?” Marissa asked. “I could go for the veggie lovers.” She pulled out a menu from her drawer and passed it around for us to see.

  After deciding on what to get, we placed the order and then went back to work. I’d gotten through a few more pages of my notes when Travis came walking in a short time later carrying two large pizzas. My mouth watered as the aroma filled the room. I glanced down at my watch and realized that it was already 6:30. I’d been frantically typing up my notes for the past hour and was only partway done. I needed to finish typing up Jennifer’s changes and then read through the entire document one last time. I sighed as I hit the disk icon on my screen to save my work. I leaned over to grab my purse from under my desk and pulled out my wallet. Opening it, I realized that I didn’t have any change, so I took out a $20 bill.

  “Aren’t you eating anything, Maddy?” Marissa asked. She and Travis were seated at the small table in our office. Someone had grabbed a few paper plates and napkins, and the two of them were already digging in.

  “Yeah, I’m coming. Here’s some money for the pizza,” I said, handing the twenty to Travis.

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said, waving my hand away.

  I shrugged, too stressed out to argue. I sat down at the table, rubbing my temples, and Marissa slid a paper plate over to me.

  “Do you want a diet coke?” Marissa asked. “I’m going to grab one from the vending machine.”

  “I don’t have any change,” I said, picking up a slice of cheese pizza.

  “I’ll get you a drink,” Travis offered, standing up. “You want a diet coke too, Marissa?”

  “Yeah, thanks,” she said, handing him some quarters.

  “Thanks, Travis,” I said, looking up to give him a weary smile.

  His deep brown eyes stared into mine for a moment as he gazed down at me. “No problem,” he said with an easy smile, before turning to walk away.

  “He’s so sweet!” Marissa gushed as he walked out the door.

  “He’s still right there,” I said, amused that she couldn’t even wait until he was gone before talking about him. I was certain that he caught what Marissa had said, and sure enough, I heard his laughter trailing down the hallway behind him.

  Travis came back a few minutes later balancing three cans of soda in his hands—two diet cokes and a regular coke for himself. Marissa had quickly eaten one slice of pizza and gone back to her desk to resume working, but I was still sitting at the table. Travis plopped down next to me, popping open my can and sliding it over to me. “You look stressed” he said, reaching over to rub the back of my neck as I took a sip.

  “That’s probably because I am,” I said with a small laugh.

  “This is crazy,” Marissa muttered to herself in the background. Travis and I both looked up, but she kept working without so much as a glance at us.

  “How late do you think you’ll be here?” he asked.

  “A couple more hours. After I finish typing up the edits for my section, I’ve still got to help Marissa proof everything.”

  “I’m about through with my section. I’ll come help you guys when I’m done.”

  Two hours later, we were all still in the office. “I’m never going to finish this,” I groaned. It was almost 9:00, and I was reading over my document. I’d finally typed up my notes from earlier, but now I wanted to double-check everything before we sent it to Jennifer. Travis was over at Marissa’s desk, helping her to proof the layout.

  I saw a duplicate word, and started repeatedly hitting the backspace key, erasing each letter. Suddenly my computer screen froze up. I kept tapping at my keyboard in frustration, but a loud beep was the only response that I got from the computer. “Damn it,” I said aloud.

  “What’s wrong?” Marissa and Travis asked in unison, looking up at me.

  “My computer just froze.”

  As I continued to try various keystrokes and clicks of my mouse, my computer responded to each attempt with another loud beep. “Ugh,” I muttered in frustration.

  Travis walked over to my desk and tried pressing a few keys, but my screen stayed frozen. “Maybe you should reboot,” he said.

  “I don’t know if it saved the latest version,” I said, shaking my head in frustration. Tears started to well in my eyes as I thought about having to start proofing my work from the very beginning of the document. I was so exhausted that I just wanted to go home, and at this rate I’d be stuck here all night.

  “It should have autosaved the latest draft,” Travis said calmly. “Do you want me to try rebooting it?”

  “I guess so,” I said sullenly. I stood up and let Travis sit down in my chair. He started trying a few different things on my computer.

  “Don’t worry, Maddy,” Marissa said. “We’ll help you read through everything if it didn’t save the latest version.”

  “Okay,” I said nodding, biting my lip and willing the tears not to spill over. I knew I was just overreacting because I was tired, but it would be embarrassing to start crying here in front of them. I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself down. It wasn’t the end of the world—I knew I’d saved all the content, so at worst, I’d just be stuck editing it all over again. Still, I did not relish the idea of redoing several hours worth of work. I was exhausted enough as it was. “I’ll be right back,” I mumbled, quickly walking toward the door. I needed a few moments to myself just to clear my head. Everyone else had gone home, so I walked alone down the silent hallway, past the dark offices, and went to sit down in our front lobby.

  I sank into the sofa there and rested my head in my hands, squeezing my eyes tightly shut. The lights were dim in the lobby—the overhead lights had been turned off for the night and just the low night lights remained on. It was so completely quiet and secluded at this time of night, I wondered if anyone walking by would even see me here. A few tears spilled down my cheeks, and I took a deep breath, trying to stop myself from crying. I couldn’t believe that I’d been working on my huge deadline for hours and hadn’t bothered to back up my files. After all the work we’d put into the project, I was going to be the one who messed it up for everyone else.

  “Maddy?”

  I jumped at the sound of Travis’s voice and wondered how long he’d been standing there. I looked up and saw him at the entrance to the lobby. His dark eyes gazed at me with worry, and I felt bad for having left him in my office to try to fix my computer. I wondered if he and Marissa thought it was rude of me to just get up and leave. Hopefully they realized that I was just blowing off some steam and needed a few minutes alone. Travis didn’t look upset now though, just worried. He stood there a moment, hesitating before coming toward me.

  “Are you okay?” he asked softly.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I said, standing up. I brushed a stray tear off my cheek, hoping he didn’t notice.

  He walked closer, looking down at me with concern. “Were you crying?”

  “I’m just stressed out,” I said, wiping away the moisture beneath my eyes with my fingertips.

  “Come here,” he said soothingly, enveloping me in his arms. I leaned against his chest and felt his strong arms around me, his hand brushing against my hair. I relaxed into him, feeling the warmth of his embrace and breathing in his scent. This was the closest we’d been all day. I knew it was silly, but I felt better when I was with him. It was like the other things just didn’t matter as much. We stood silently for
a few minutes, neither of us moving or saying a word, simply content to be together.

  Travis started to gently stroke my back. “I was able to retrieve the file on your computer, so you’re all set.”

  “Oh thank God!” I said, feeling relief wash over me. “I’m sorry I left you there,” I said, resting my cheek against his chest and taking a deep breath. “I just needed a minute alone.”

  “You don’t have to apologize,” he said softly, lowering his head so that his mouth was hovering near my ear.

  “I’m glad that you stayed late tonight to help us,” I said softly.

  “Of course,” he replied, nuzzling against me. “You know, this is the first time we’ve really been alone all week.”

  “I know, I was just thinking earlier today that we’ve been so busy, we’ve barely gotten to spend any time together.”

  “We’ll do something this weekend,” he assured me. “After this whole project is over.”

  “That sounds good to me,” I said softly, not wanting to move from his arms. Eventually, I pulled back and looked up at him. He gazed down at me without saying a word, searching my eyes to make certain that I was okay. Eventually he bent down, and his lips tenderly met mine. Our kiss was all too brief, but as we separated, Travis reached out and took my hand so that we could head back upstairs. His warm fingers clasped tightly around mine, and I smiled as I looked up into his dark eyes.

  “Shall we go finish, then?” he asked. “Marissa is probably wondering what happened to us.”

  “Yeah, let’s go. It’s been a long day, and I am so ready to get out of here.”

  “You want to stay at my place tonight? It’s closer,” he added, with a twinkle in his eye.

  I smiled up at him. “Tempting, but I think I need to just go home after today. Rain check?”

  “Definitely,” he said, bringing my hand up and brushing his lips against it. Then, hand in hand, we walked together through the silent lobby and back upstairs to my office.

  Chapter 20

  The next day, we celebrated finalizing our first quarterly publication with lunch at the burger place Travis and I had been to earlier in the week. Although it was only Thursday, with all the crazy hours we’d been putting in, lunch together felt like ages ago now. We had stayed until midnight last night, with Travis dropping Marissa and me off at our respective apartments around 12:30 this morning. He’d given me a quick kiss goodbye in the car but hadn’t come up as we were both exhausted by that point. I was very much looking forward to a quiet weekend with Travis. It was one thing seeing him in the office every day, but it wasn’t exactly quality time together with the others around.